Odontomachus insularis

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Odontomachus insularis
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Hymenoptera
Family: Formicidae
Subfamily: Ponerinae
Tribe: Ponerini
Genus: Odontomachus
Species: O. insularis
Binomial name
Odontomachus insularis
Guérin-Méneville, 1844

Odontomachus insularis casent0217541 p 1 high.jpg

Odontomachus insularis casent0217541 d 1 high.jpg

Specimen Labels

The last taxonomic revision of Odontomachus (Brown 1976) revealed a tangle of names, subspecies and varieties for this and numerous allied forms. Odontomachus insularis is known to occur in the Greater Antilles and the Bahamas. Its presence in other areas is tenuous pending a more thorough taxonomic revision.

Identification

Brown (1976) - A member of the Odontomachus haematodus group. O. insularis has cephalic striation so fine that Guerin could not see it when he wrote the original description, and it has a sericeous look at lower magnifications. The male is black or piceous in color, with a brown gaster, and the worker has palpal segmentation 4, 3. In addition to the many records of insularis from Cuba (type locality) and the Bahamas, I have seen a single worker labeled as from Diquini, Haiti (W. M. Mann).

Odontomachus clarus is a very closely related species replacing insularis on the continent, where it ranges from Central Texas and southern Arizona southward in Mexico at least to Mexico City and the state of Guerrero, apparently mainly in arid and semiarid areas on the Mexican Plateau and in the cordilleras. Although it is more variable in size and color, clarus is like insularis, and it also shares with insularis the dark-colored male and 4, 3 palpal segmentation. In fact, the only reliable worker character I can find to separate the two is the different development of the acute apex of the petiolar node. In insularis, the node narrows fairly abruptly (in side view) to a long, thin, backcurved spine, which may occupy a quarter or more of the total height of the node. In O. clarus, the node as seen from the side tapers rapidly to a much shorter spine, which often is not really a spine at all, but simply a sharp conical apex.

Keys including this Species

Distribution

Latitudinal Distribution Pattern

Latitudinal Range: 24.433333° to 5.519°.

   
North
Temperate
North
Subtropical
Tropical South
Subtropical
South
Temperate

Distribution based on Regional Taxon Lists

Neotropical Region: Barbados, Cuba (type locality), Dominican Republic, Greater Antilles, Grenada, Guadeloupe, Haiti, Lesser Antilles, Mexico, Saint Lucia, Trinidad and Tobago.

It is also found in Mexico, Dominican Republic, Saint Lucia, Trinidad and Tobago and Grenada (but see above concerning this ant's taxonomy and distribution).

Distribution based on AntMaps

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Distribution based on AntWeb specimens

Check data from AntWeb

Countries Occupied

Number of countries occupied by this species based on AntWiki Regional Taxon Lists. In general, fewer countries occupied indicates a narrower range, while more countries indicates a more widespread species.
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Estimated Abundance

Relative abundance based on number of AntMaps records per species (this species within the purple bar). Fewer records (to the left) indicates a less abundant/encountered species while more records (to the right) indicates more abundant/encountered species.
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Biology

Association with Other Organisms

Explore-icon.png Explore: Show all Associate data or Search these data. See also a list of all data tables or learn how data is managed.
  • This species is a host for the eucharitid wasp Kapala terminalis (a parasite) (Universal Chalcidoidea Database) (primary host).
  • This species is a host for the eucharitid wasp Kapala sp. (a parasitoid) (Quevillon, 2018) (multiple encounter modes; direct transmission; transmission outside nest).

Castes

Images from AntWeb

Odontomachus insularis casent0246015 h 1 high.jpgOdontomachus insularis casent0246015 p 1 high.jpgOdontomachus insularis casent0246015 d 1 high.jpgOdontomachus insularis casent0246015 l 1 high.jpg
Queen (alate/dealate). Specimen code casent0246015. Photographer Andrea Walker, uploaded by California Academy of Sciences. Owned by USNM, Washington, DC, USA.
Odontomachus insularis casent0270607 h 1 high.jpgOdontomachus insularis casent0270607 p 1 high.jpgOdontomachus insularis casent0270607 d 1 high.jpgOdontomachus insularis casent0270607 l 1 high.jpg
Worker. Specimen code casent0270607. Photographer Ryan Perry, uploaded by California Academy of Sciences. Owned by PSWC, Philip S. Ward Collection.

Nomenclature

The following information is derived from Barry Bolton's Online Catalogue of the Ants of the World.

  • insularis. Odontomachus insularis Guérin-Méneville, 1844a: 423 (w.m.) CUBA.
    • Type-material: lectotype worker (by designation of Brown, 1976a: 135).
    • [Note: Guérin-Méneville also describes a syntype male.]
    • Type-locality: Cuba (no further data).
    • Type-depository: MNHN.
    • Forel, 1897b: 298 (q.).
    • Subspecies of haematodus: Emery, 1890b: 44 (footnote); Emery, in Dalla Torre, 1893: 50 (footnote); Emery, 1895c: 268; Forel, 1897b: 298; Forel, 1899c: 20; Wheeler, W.M. 1905b: 82, 122; Wheeler, W.M. 1906e: 349; Forel, 1908c: 340; Forel, 1909a: 252; Forel, 1910b: 10; Wheeler, W.M. 1910g: 562; Emery, 1911d: 115; Forel, 1912c: 28; Wheeler, W.M. 1913b: 482; Wheeler, W.M. 1913c: 113; Wheeler, W.M. 1913d: 240; Forel, 1913l: 207; Wheeler, W.M. & Mann, 1914: 17; Wheeler, W.M. 1916d: 323; Wheeler, W.M. 1917g: 458; Luederwaldt, 1918: 36; Wheeler, W.M. 1919d: 303; Mann, 1920: 404; Wheeler, W.M. 1922c: 4; Borgmeier, 1923: 78; Wheeler, W.M. 1923c: 3; Menozzi, 1929a: 2; Menozzi & Russo, 1930: 151; Smith, M.R. 1930a: 2; Wheeler, W.M. 1932a: 3; Wheeler, W.M. 1934f: 139; Wheeler, W.M. 1935g: 16; Wheeler, W.M. 1936b: 196; Wheeler, W.M. 1937b: 446; Smith, M.R. 1939d: 127 (redescription); Creighton, 1950a: 56; Smith, M.R. 1951a: 787; Smith, M.R. 1954c: 2; Smith, M.R. 1958c: 112; Smith, M.R. 1967: 348; Kempf, 1972a: 171; Alayo, 1974: 31.
    • Status as species: Smith, F. 1858b: 79; Roger, 1861a: 26; Roger, 1863b: 22; Mayr, 1863: 438; Dalla Torre, 1893: 51; Taylor & Wilson, 1962: 142; Brown, 1976a: 104, 135; Smith, D.R. 1979: 1345; Brandão, 1991: 363; Bolton, 1995b: 296; Guénard & Economo, 2015: 228; Wetterer, et al. 2016: 14; Lubertazzi, 2019: 138.
    • Material of the unavailable names pallens, wheeleri referred here by Brown, 1976a: 104; Brandão, 1991: 363.
    • Distribution: Antigua, Bahamas, Barbados, Bermuda, Brazil, Clipperton I., Colombia, Costa Rica (Cocos Is), Cuba, Dominican Republic, Grenada, Haiti, Jamaica, Martinique, Mexico (Tres Marias Is), Peru, Puerto Rico (Mona I.), Trinidad, U.S.A.

Unless otherwise noted the text for the remainder of this section is reported from the publication that includes the original description.

Brown (1976) - Odontomachus insularis, as determined from the type worker, here designated as lectotype, in Paris (Musee National d'Histoire Naturelle), and confirmed by the original description, is the reddish form with yellowish appendages and dark (piceous or black) gaster, common and widespread in Cuba and the Bahamas. So far as I have been able to determine from actual specimens, the true insularis does not occur on the continent of North America or in the Florida Keys, although it would not be surprising to find it somewhere in Florida. The varieties pallens and wheeleri are just the ordinary insularis, judging from their types. In var. wheeleri, the dorsum of the propodeum and the petiole are perhaps more yellowish than usual, but this condition is approached by occasional workers in other nest series. Wheeler described pallens, apparently, while thinking the dark Cuban species, here referred to as O. brunneus, was insularis.

Description

Type Material

Brown (1976) designated a specimen in the Musee National d'Histoire Naturelle as the lectotype.

References

References based on Global Ant Biodiversity Informatics

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  • Borgmeier T. 1923. Catalogo systematico e synonymico das formigas do Brasil. 1 parte. Subfam. Dorylinae, Cerapachyinae, Ponerinae, Dolichoderinae. Archivos do Museu Nacional (Rio de Janeiro) 24: 33-103.
  • Brandao, C.R.F. 1991. Adendos ao catalogo abreviado das formigas da regiao neotropical (Hymenoptera: Formicidae). Rev. Bras. Entomol. 35: 319-412.
  • Brown W. L., Jr. 1976. Contributions toward a reclassification of the Formicidae. Part VI. Ponerinae, tribe Ponerini, subtribe Odontomachiti. Section A. Introduction, subtribal characters. Genus Odontomachus. Stud. Entomol. 19: 67-171.
  • CSIRO Collection
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